Former England skipper Nasser Hussain, who is known for his deep cricket analysis, analyzed the way the Indian batsmen have been dismissed so far in the ongoing 5-match Test series by the England bowlers.
The Indian top guns once again failed to score big in their first innings of the 4th Test match at The Oval. The Indian cricket team was dismissed for 190 runs, with the Indian skipper Virat Kohli and all-rounder Shardul Thakur contributing with their respective half-centuries. Apart from them, none of the Indian batsmen could get going in the first innings of team India.
In his column for the Daily Mail, Nasser Hussain wrote about Joe Root’s bowlers have not had to change their plans much to get the better of Indian top-guns including the likes of Virat Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara, KL Rahul, Rohit Sharma, and Ajinkya Rahane. He wrote:
“And what will concern India – at least until Shardul Thakur connected with a few – was the repetitive nature of their dismissals. Basically, England haven’t had to rethink many of their plans,”
Hussain explained how England bowlers have been planning against each of the Indian batsmen. He wrote:
“You bowl a certain length to Rohit, but a bit fuller to KL Rahul. To Cheteshwar Pujara, you aim at fourth stump. To Kohli, you drag back your length a touch. And with Chris Woakes making a welcome return to the side, England had the perfect attack for these conditions,”
Virat Kohli, who is waiting to score a century since November 2019, scored a half-century with the help of some stunning cover drives in his innings before he was once again dismissed by Robinson. As per Hussain, bowlers who deliver it from a certain height have troubled Virat a lot. He wrote:
“But Robinson has got him three times in this series, which is a great feather in his cap, and it may have something to do with his release point. Since the start of 2020, India average only 18 against bowlers with a release point above 2.15m – the likes of New Zealand’s Kyle Jamieson, as well as Craig Overton and Robinson here – so in that sense he’s exploiting a bit of a weakness,”
He also wrote that people shouldn’t be too hard on Virat as he bears an extra burder of leading the Indian side because of all the demands that come with the job. He wrote:
“Having said all that, we shouldn’t be too hard on Kohli. The amount of cricket that both these sides play – more any other teams in the world – can be exhausting, and Kohli bears the extra burden of captaining India, with all the demands that come with the job.”
He added:
“It’s no great surprise if he starts to play some tired shots outside off stump. The fact is, he still found time in an impossibly busy schedule to tinker with his game. And, for a while, it was a joy to watch,”
